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Friday, June 28, 2013

This blog post was written as part of my sponsored partnership with Stiletto Media Blogger Network. One of my greatest passions is feeding people, and I loved learning about this amazing effort to feed those impacted by the devastation caused by Superstorm Sandy and the inspiring short film that shows this teamwork in action.

During the tragedy of last fall's Superstorm Sandy, Toyota and the Food Bank For New York City came together and used small changes to make a big impact for so many families impacted by this devastating disaster. Members from the Toyota Production System Support Center teamed up with the Food Bank For New York City staff in the "Meals Per Hour" with the goal of increasing the number of meals being given out per hour.

By making small changes in the production and delivery methods, emergency meal boxes distributed increased from 25 boxes per hour to an incredible 450 boxes per hour. There were 250,000 meals provided in this process. Can you think of ways that you can do small changes that can make a big difference?Last year, I was inspired to begin using reusable shopping bags after learning about some staggering statistics about plastic shopping bags so often used today. Thinking about these facts makes me understand why simply saving the use of one plastic bag during a small shopping trip contributes to making a big impact at improving the quality of our planet:* The petroleum used to produce 14 plastic bags is enough to drive a car one mile.* More than 10% of washed-up debris polluting the U.S. coastline is made up of plastic bags.* Plastic bags take anywhere from 15 to 1000 years to decompose. If they are not recycled, they end up in landfills, the ocean, or some other place in the environment. There's actually a giant garbage heap made mostly of plastic floating in the ocean that's twice the size of the United States.Facts like these make me realize that my small act of bringing a reusable shopping bag with me to use contributes in a big way to making a difference in lessening the damage done to our planet by plastic bags. YOU have a chance to do a small gesture that can make a big impact right now. Supermarche' filmed this 6 minute documentary that gives you a glimpse into how these small changes made a huge difference in helping so many families impacted by Superstorm Sandy.For every view the documentary receives, Toyota will donate one meal to the Food Bank For New York City, up to 1,000,000 meals by July 19. Click on play to fill a plate and help Toyota meet their 1,000,000 meal goal.

Disclosure: This post was written as part of my sponsored partnership with the Stiletto Media Blogger Network. All opinions expressed in this blog post are my own.

Wednesday, June 19, 2013

I have always loved that this time of year always brings so many milestone passages, with each one seeming to bring a sense of newness, hope and promise. I recently congratulated one of the special graduates in my life who became a spring 2013 graduate of my alma mater university in Oklahoma, Northeastern State University in my hometown of Tahlequah. I realized that their spring passage marked 13 years since I took my spring passage across that stage to receive my master's degree. It made me recall many memories of the day I became a millenium graduate as part of the Class of 2000. I thought about not only pieces of advice I was given by loved ones as the day went on and my celebration continued at a graduation party in my honor, but also thought about what I had done with the advice I was given that day in regard to applying it to my life, my career path.
Now no longer the graduate receiving the advice, I find myself giving my best pieces of advice to the graduates in my life at all levels, this year alone ranging from preschool into high school, vo-tech school, college and law school. It is always my hope as I impart the advice, that it would be something the recipient will take to heart and might even find applying to their life somewhere down the road.
For me, some of my favorite advice includes my late maternal grandmother Grandma Cleva telling me to appreciate my school education, but also approach life through the eyes of the "School of Hard Knocks" and be able to apply an equal amount of common sense as I navigate through life. My late mother on my master's degree graduation day gave me a book small in size but big in inspiration, called "Don't Sweat the Small Stuff". During the past 13 years since that day, with much of that time being since she has passed from this life, I find myself in times of hurriedness, stress or even in general times of normalcy, reflecting if I am actually enbracing those words of her advice to "not sweat the small stuff" as I go through life.
I would love to know what are some of your best pieces of advice you would offer graduates in the Class of 2013? How have you applied this advice to your own life and/or career path?